I reviewed the first book in the series a few weeks ago and I had the follow up waiting on the “to read” pile. There are no surprises here. The main characters continue to fight. The aliens continue to press against humanity. More explosions. More space battles. Some character development. Except this time, the humans take the fight to foreign territory. Overall I was a little let down though. Maybe it’s because I have been reading too many books in this genre for quite a while. But, parts of the story just seemed to be out of focus. For humans to be so near transcendence, they still come across things that wow them.

And here is another example: there is a scene where a couple of characters are speculating on why the Sh’daar want to block the GRIN technologies: “Maybe part of the Sh’daar has transcended and those left behind are mad about it” (in so many words). And sure enough a few pages later, we get some hints from the alien side that that is exactly what has happened. Really? We humans are so smart. Okay.

I guess I am becoming a much more discriminating reader. I want deep intrigue. I want something to twist my mind around. I guess that’s what Inception has done to all of us. With all of that said, if this is a trilogy, I will be reading the next one.